


Don't Touch My Laundry

by thewesterndoor



Series: Strange Neighbours [1]
Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Neighbors, Fluff, M/M, Masturbation in Shower, Victor Nikiforov is Extra, laundry room shenanigans, passive aggressive notes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-12
Updated: 2018-08-12
Packaged: 2019-06-18 12:14:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,893
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15485517
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thewesterndoor/pseuds/thewesterndoor
Summary: All Yuuri wanted to do was get his laundry done in peace, was that too much to ask?  For the neighbour that keeps insisting on pulling Yuuri's clothes out of the machines, the answer is apparently yes. So how has the passive aggressive correspondence become the highlight of his Friday nights?





	Don't Touch My Laundry

It was Friday night, and against the threats and pleading of his roommate, Yuuri’s plans consisted solely of tackling his mountain of laundry.

“We’re in college! We should be going out and getting drunk! Making memories that we can regret sharing on Instagram the next day,” Phichit had said, giving Yuuri doe-eyes.

But Yuuri had stayed strong.

It wasn’t that hard really. Everything about going out made him anxious. He had to worry about whether he was dressed up enough for the club, or dressed down enough for the bar; whether he was going to say or do something that revealed just how pathetic he was; whether people were judging the fact that three years later, Yuuri was still holding onto his Frosh Fifteen. A night at home, going between the safety of his sofa and the communal laundry room, was much more preferable. And because nobody else was boring enough to do their laundry on a Friday night, there would be no waiting for machines.

Yuuri had figured out that one cycle in the washer or dryer was about the length of an episode of _Doctor Who_ , and so he had set up the first load and gone back to his apartment to start his evening of bingeing.

After his episode had finished, when he returned to the small laundromat, Yuuri’s first thought was surprise that the washer still hadn’t finished. He could hear the steady thump of clothes and water churning, but when he looked at the machine he could see that the wash cycle had just begun, and there was a pile of clothes in a basket in front. A pile of wet clothes. A pile of _Yuuri’s_ wet clothes.

He stormed over, picking up the basket and glaring down at the damp fabric before his gaze swung around to the machine.

 _Who had been in such a goddamn rush that they couldn’t wait five minutes for him to get back and switch machines?_ he thought furiously as he flung his clothes into the dryer. With more force that was strictly necessary, he slammed the door shut and pressed the on button.

Yuuri _hated_ when people moved his clothes. There was something about the idea of some stranger looking at his stuff that made his skin crawl and his thoughts go sharp.

Searching the room, Yuuri found an old flyer and a well-chewed pencil. Quickly, before he could think too hard about it, he wrote a note and slammed the flyer down on top of the washing machine where it was sure to be seen.

**_Kindly leave any clothes where you found them. If you had waited two minutes I would have been here to move them myself._ **

He couldn’t help but read and reread the words, wondering if he’d been too timid, or too rude. The urge to grab the flyer, crumple it up, and toss it into the giant trash can was like an itch, but Yuuri decided the principle of the matter was more important than his current state of anxiety.

Before he could give in to the feelings, he ran out the door and back to the next episode of his marathon.

When the episode had finished, Yuuri walked back over.

Inside, he was greeted with his clothes piled up and _folded_ in the basket, and the flyer had been moved to the top of the clothes.

In a looping script someone had added below: _Sorry, needed to get this started. But if you’re not going to be here, not much else I can do. Have a great Friday night!_

***

A week later and Yuuri was in the same predicament.

After a week of dance classes, there was no way he could just skip doing laundry, but he also couldn’t afford to spend the whole evening watching the machines. He had reached the point in the term where his schedule was as intricate as the workings of a watch, and the slightest change would result in catastrophe. Tonight, a World Lit paper had to be finished so that he could spend the rest of the weekend cramming for his Osteology midterm on Monday.

At first he had just planned to  take his laptop down with him, but he had quickly realized that wouldn’t work. The room was only big enough to hold the machines, with a plastic chair crammed into one corner. Yuuri had tried valiantly for the first ten minutes of the wash cycle to write with his computer balanced on his thighs, but in the awkward juggle to find quotes from the novel or refer back to his outline, he’d been forced to give it up as a lost cause.

If he was going to actually have a hope of getting work done and being able to sleep that night before his Saturday morning dance class, then Yuuri needed to be working somewhere he could spread out.

So he and his laptop had trekked back to the apartment with a timer set. But when the timer went off, Yuuri was midway through a paragraph describing the use of flowers as symbols for different archetypes of love throughout the novel that he hadn’t quite been able to step away. With one eye on the clock, Yuuri had typed furiously, trying to get all of his thoughts down before he lost them and hoping that the previous week had just been a fluke.

When he had finally managed to ramble his way towards something approaching an argument, Yuuri saved his paper and hustled back to the laundromat.

Inside was the same bright pink basket as last time, and he could smell a sort of rain-washed sage—the same detergent smell as last time. Piled up in said basket, placed in front of the dryer, were Yuuri’s clothes. As he neared his laundry he could see a single piece of paper had been left on top.

The paper had a heavy, stiff feeling in Yuuri’s hands, like it had come from some sort of fancy notepad, and the ink was a deep, rich blue.

 _Who brings their own stationery to do laundry_? Was there really someone who could be that extra?

Staring down at the page was answer enough. Clearly there _was_ someone who was that extra.

Sorry! I tried to wait for you this time, but I had to get back to my place. By the way, some of your clothes really should be washed separately. Jeans will wreak havoc on your delicates.

Fuming, Yuuri took a petty pleasure in throwing _all_ of his clothes into the dryer. So what if his dance clothes should have been hanged to dry? They were _Yuuri’s_ clothes and he would do whatever he damn well wanted with them.

Dryer now on, Yuuri turned back to the note. Finding the same pencil as last week, Yuuri scratched out a reply.

**_I can only assume that you have a weird thing for handling strangers clothes. Leave them alone. Please._ **

As an afterthought he added, **_It’s rude to comment on other people’s laundry. Some of us prefer to save our quarters for more important things._ **

He slammed the paper down on top of the washing machine and returned back to the apartment and his paper. This time, however, he couldn’t quite slip into the flow of writing, and he kept thinking back to the note. Did that mean that he hurried back over once his timer went off? Absolutely not.

Instead Yuuri walked into the kitchen and flicked the switch on the small chrome kettle. Once the water had boiled, he made himself a cup of tea and wandered over to the large living room window. From there he could just about see the entrance to the laundromat, and as he took a sip of his tea he caught a glimpse of a figure darting between the cars in that direction.

It was too far for him to notice anything other than a lean frame and pale hair. Yuuri wondered what the person might look like up close, and whether they’d smell of the sage of their detergent.

Yuuri turned away sharply and slugged back the rest of his drink, scalding his tongue.

It was ridiculous for him to pin any fantasies onto the other person locked in this passive aggressive war. Phichit would have said it was evidence that Yuuri needed to get out, and he didn’t disagree.

Still, after he had washed his mug and put it onto the dish rack to dry, deciding it was time for him to head down, Yuuri wondered what he would find when he walked into the laundromat.

***

“Got you!” Yuuri hissed in delight as he walked into the laundromat.

It had been another week, and all he could say was that he had survived. The paper had been turned in, the midterm had been written, and Yuuri had been ready for a night where he could just crawl into his oldest sweatpants, watch campy sci-fi and return some order to the chaos of his life.

Instead, Phichit had decided that it was Roommates Best Friend Night—Phichit liked to give everything a title; he said it was part of his brand for social media—and had guilted Yuuri into going for pizza. Instead of choosing one of the dozen perfectly reasonable pizza places that were near the campus, Phichit had chosen the one that did artisanal pizzas with odd toppings. It was also the one that served their drinks in fish bowls.

Before Yuuri could protest, Phichit had ordered a Mai Tai for himself and a Long Island Iced Tea for Yuuri—for the Instagram pictures, Phichit had sworn, though Yuuri suspected that it was his best friend’s way of trying to get him to loosen up.

By the time dinner had finished, Yuuri was loose limbed and heady, his anxiety muffled just enough that he felt euphoric. It was nice not to be living with the fear of what might happen ten minutes down the line, or a half hour, or a day.

Gathering his stuff to do laundry took longer than it should have, but finally he had made it to the laundromat. And to his delight, the washing machine was in use. From the smell of sage and the familiar pink basket sitting on the concrete, Yuuri knew exactly who had beat him to the machine.

Because fate apparently liked Drunk Yuuri a lot more than Sober Yuuri, the buzzer of the washer rang out through the room, and he could hear the final thumps as it came to a standstill. Taking a quick look towards the door, drunkenly cackling, Yuuri dashed over and started flinging the wet clothes into the basket.

He was astonished to see that any one person could have that many thongs. That they might have to _wash_ that many thongs in a given week. Suddenly Yuuri was back to wondering what this person—man if the clothes were anything to go by—was like. Could it have been some beefy guy, the thongs evidence of a midlife crisis?

Thinking of that figure he had seen, and the note he’d been left, that image didn’t fit. An image started to build in his mind of someone young, attractive, with the sort of zero shits attitude that it would take to live your life in a rainbow glitter thong.

Telling himself that it was only because he was drunk, the man in Yuri’s mind started to take the shape of Viktor Nikiforov. Yuuri had been half in love with the handsome grad student since he’d first wandered into one of Viktor’s photography exhibitions in the Fine Arts building. He had _dreamed_ of what that platinum hair might feel like between his fingers, of how Yuuri’s name would sound in Viktor’s Russian accent, and whether the rumours about Viktor’s dick were true—god, he hoped they were true.

 _Viktor would definitely be the sort of person to wear thongs_ , Yuuri decided. And why wouldn’t he? If Yuuri looked anything like Viktor he would constantly be putting his body on display. Instead Yuri had a body with thighs that were always a little too thick, no matter how much dance he did, and a stomach that would turn to rolls if he so much as _looked_ at carbs.

It took a moment--and panic caused by the shadow of someone walking past the door--for Yuuri to snap out of his fantasy. Trying to ignore the pooling heat in his gut, and the fact that just the thought of Viktor had him half-hard, Yuuri threw his clothes into the washing machine and got it started.

On an afterthought he grabbed another flyer and scrawled a quick message.

**_Who the fuck needs so many thongs? Didn’t you wash your clothes last week? Should I be looking for you at a strip club somewhere?_ **

Back in his apartment, Yuuri headed straight for the shower. Phichit may have decided to continue the night without Yuuri’s company, but he could come back any time and was known to barge in without knocking. The bathroom, with the only interior door that locked, was the sole safe place for Yuuri to have some privacy.

Under the hot spray of water, Yuuri let those images return. He pictured platinum hair and eyes so blue you could drown in them; he pictured pale skin that he would explore with his mouth and fingers, marking and tasting; he pictured one of those thongs, and the moment that he got to pull it off its wearer. Yuuri’s hand slid down his chest towards his cock. Wrapping his fingers around himself, he gave a few quick pumps, groaning at the sensation.

It didn’t take long before he was coming, his hips bucking and his thoughts turning to static.

Limbs a little shaky, Yuuri climbed out of the shower and pulled his clothes back on.

Outside the rest of the apartment was still quiet, and Yuuri grabbed a bottled water from the fridge, drinking it down in a few quick gulps.

Already the buzz was starting to wear off, and he could feel a hot prickle creeping up his neck, his cheeks warming over what he had done.

He had just jerked off to the thought of a complete stranger. Two, if you counted the man who’s underwear had set off all of Yuuri’s thoughts. And he had left that note…

Yuuri moaned, pressing his forehead against the door of the fridge.

Why had he left that note?

All he could do was hunker down on the couch under a blanket, waiting until there was no possible way he would encounter the mystery man.

When he finally did venture out, the laundromat was silent. The dryer was empty, the door slightly ajar, and the pink basket was gone. But Yuuri’s note had been moved to the top of the washing machine.

With shaking fingers, he picked it up.

I don’t usually show them off to other people, but anytime you want a show ;) 

A shudder rippled down Yuuri’s spine, and frissons of heat exploded in his belly.

_Who the hell was this man?_

***

Yuuri and the mystery man settled into a strange routine. Earlier and earlier each Friday he would find himself getting excited for his trip down to the laundromat.

Whichever of them claimed the machine first would expect to find their clothes moved and a note left for them. And with each week the notes started to evolve.

It was like a seal had been broken. The notes started to progress from sharp to a weird sort of flirting. At least Yuuri _thought_ it was flirting. Normally it was Phichit who told him days after a party that the hockey player had been trying to ask him out all night, but Yuuri didn’t want to ask his roommate about this.

Are you an athlete? It seems like you have a lot of workout clothes. Is it weird that I’m picturing you as some type of gorgeous dancer? One of the notes had read.

Yuuri had so badly wanted to say yes. The idea that this man had started to imagine him did odd things to his stomach and made his thoughts feel pleasantly fuzzy, but that really wasn’t him. He was a dancer, sure—he was even a good dancer—but gorgeous he was not.

But he couldn’t bring himself to say no. He wanted to keep the fantasy going. Bringing up the fact that in terms of looks he was a dime a dozen would almost certainly kill whatever was going on here.

Instead he’d just written, **_What about you? What do you do when you’re not stripping?_ **

When he had returned, his first thought was that his note had been a step too far. The note should have been left on top of the dryer with his clothes, but there was nothing there.

Crackling static filled Yuuri’s thoughts and his throat was tight at the thought that he had managed to ruin it all. He’d ruined it just by trying _not_ to ruin it. Typical.

But when he turned around, he caught sight of the paper over on the washing machine.

Photography. I wanted to make sure I would never know what it was like to feel financially secure when I chose my major. But really, it’s all a big con. I wanted an excuse to take pictures of all of the dogs. ALL OF THEM. 

There was a heavy double thump in Yuuri’s chest at those words.

It was pathetic how happy he was that the photography helped fuel his Viktor Nikiforov fantasy. But really, the thing Yuuri kept thinking about over and over was that this man liked dogs.

He would never turn out to be the gorgeous, talented Russian of Yuuri’s dreams, but the man _was_ funny—albeit with some boundary issues—and _he liked dogs_.

Years had passed since Yuuri had been able to make the trip home to see his family. The first few months, when Yuuri had been drowning in homesickness, it was thoughts of the family poodle that had hurt the most.

One night, he and Phichit had drunkenly created lists about their ideal men, , and loving dogs had been number two on his. Being Viktor Nikiforov had been number one.

Without thinking too much about it, Yuuri quickly wrote out a reply with the pen he’d tucked into his back pocket.

**_Dogs!!! Show me._ **

The next week, when he found his laundry moved—by this point in their strange relationship, the clothes weren’t just left in a pile, his mystery man had actually separated out the clothes that needed to be hanged to dry and put them onto a set of plastic hangers—there was a 4”x6” picture of a large poodle smiling into the camera.

Kind of cheating. Not all of the dogs, just my dog. But she is the best dog. Fight me. These hangers are for you. Couldn’t bear the thought of these sweaters in a tumble dryer anymore. 

Yuuri’s heart lurched, and this time it wasn’t because he was imagining this person as someone else.

_Was it possible for him to fall in love via passive aggressive notes?_

Before he could think too deeply about it he wrote his reply.

**_Yes, she is. Thanks._ **

For a moment, looking between the photograph and the hangers, Yuuri wondered if he should stay. What would happen if he didn’t leave? The washing machine would be finished in about fifteen minutes, and the Mystery Man would arrive soon after to move everything into the dryer. Maybe it was time for him to wait and see what this person was like in the flesh. To get a name for him.

But what if he took one look at Yuuri and decided Yuuri was nothing like the person imagined?

Yuuri wasn’t ready for all of this to end.

So, he grabbed the hangers by the hooks and slipped out into the night.

When he returned an hour later to collect his dried clothes—the mystery man had actually folded them all, including his boxers—the short note made Yuuri’s heart stop.

You should meet her. And me. We’ll be at the dog park tomorrow at 1. 

***

It was a quarter to one and Yuuri still hadn’t decided if he was going to the dog park.

He had changed his mind a half dozen times over the past hour alone. At one point he had grown so mired in his own thoughts that he’d pulled out one of his notebooks to make a pros and cons chart.

Glancing down he looked over the two columns.

The pros list consisted of: likes dogs, owns a dog, funny.

Gaze sliding over to the cons he had: touches other people’s stuff, clearly extra af, might be a serial killer.

Yuuri still wasn’t sure whether Mystery Man’s extensive thong collection belonged on the pros or cons side.

Another moment and he added ‘thoughtful’ to the pros. It might have been in an overtop, zero boundaries sort of way, but Yuuri couldn’t forget the fact that the man had separated his clothes and brought him hangers.

Though maybe Yuuri had read way too much into that. It was possible that the man just really cared whether or not garment care instructions were followed.

He groaned and sunk back into the couch, dropping the notebook against his face.

_What was he going to do?_

The worst part was that there was only one thing he _could_ do. If he went to the park, there was a chance they could decide to follow this weird thread and see what had been building through the notes, or the man could take one look at Yuuri and decide that he wasn’t interested. The chance for success, or for the sort of failure that would lead to Yuuri eating his weight in ice cream for a week. But at least there was a chance; he had the feeling that if he didn’t go to the park that would be the end of everything. There would be no more notes, and no more imagining.

God, he was going to do it, wasn’t he?

Yuuri pulled on his sneakers, slipping a hoodie on over his t-shirt. As he walked down the hallway to the stairs, Yuuri sent a quick text to Phichit.

 **_Going to meet a strange man in the dog park. Tell my family I loved them if you don’t hear from me in an hour_ **.

Phichit’s reply was instant—his replies, across all platforms, were _always_ instant.

** _Lmfao. Have fun!_ **

It was followed by a text that was just a string of emojis.

Yuuri wasn’t sure if it was insulting that his roommate clearly thought Yuuri was joking, or if it was a sign that what he was doing was idiotic.

No. He was doing this.There was no backing out now.How dangerous could the dog park be in the afternoon?

Plus, it was the dog park. Yuuri hadn’t realized how desperately he missed dog cuddles until he’d been handed the opportunity.

The park wasn’t far, and Yuuri passed through the gates with a few minutes to spare. Just to the side of the broad gravel path there was  a large wooden sign pointing the direction of the off-leash area.

Each step made Yuuri’s heart race, and he wondered if it might just explode like a rabbit’s before he even got to the park. His body all but shook with the thud of it.

But then the path was giving way to a grass covered hill. What might have been green and lush during the summer had gone brown with the shift towards winter, bare branches reaching up towards the grey sky. At the top of the hill, Yuuri could see the outline of a large dog.

Its head turned as he started up the incline of the hill, and then it gave a happy bark before it was racing down towards him.

Yuuri just had time for impression of curly brown fur and large liquid eyes before doggy paws landed on his chest and he was pushed backwards. Before he had even hit the ground, a wet nose pushed his glasses off his face and a massive pink tongue started to lick at his cheeks.

“Makkachin,” a low voice called out.

Without his glasses, Yuuri could only really see the vague shape of the person running towards him and the dog. Of course his first possible glimpse of the mystery man would be one where he couldn’t see anything beyond blobs of colour.

A hand reached out, grabbing hold of the dog’s collar to yank her back. It was quickly followed by his glasses being pressed into his hands.

“I’m so sorry. She’s normally so good. Pretty good. I think she just knew that today was going to be a big day.”

Putting his glasses back on, Yuuri finally looked up towards the man. Every single cell in Yuuri’s body froze and then exploded. He forgot how to breathe.

Smiling down at him, silver hair drifting softly in the crisp breeze, the very picture of casual elegance in a black wool pea coat, was Viktor Nikiforov.

Viktor Nikiforov was not only standing in front of him, he was smiling. At Yuuri.

“You’re Yuuri, right?” Viktor said.

Yuuri was sure he must have died. That was the only possible way he was hearing Viktor Nikiforov say Yuuri’s name, lingering on the first vowel.

“You know me?”

Nodding, Viktor’s smile grew even broader.

“You probably don’t remember it, but we met at a Slam Poetry night in the student union building. It was a dry event, but somehow…”

Scouring his memory, Yuuri tried to think of when it could have been. His social life was sparse enough that there weren’t many options, but he definitely would have remembered if he gone anywhere Viktor had been…

Except if it had been in the SUB…

Yuuri pushed himself up to his feet and looked around for a quick getaway, or maybe a sinkhole—he would settle for a lake where he could just go drown himself now.

“I think that must have been the night of the Dance Society function…” Yuuri mumbled. “It was in The Pub, and…I had a lot of friends buying me drinks. I…kind of make bad decisions when I’m drunk. I’m sorry for whatever I may have done.”

“Are you kidding me?” Viktor laughed. “It was easily the best night of that term!”

There was short whine from off to the side, pulling Yuuri’s attention back to the dog. He held out his hand and she scurried over, tail thumping against his leg and body wriggling as he scratched behind her ears.

Slowly it dawned on him that _this_ was the dog in the photograph. And that he and Viktor were the only people in the park. Unless he had been stood up, _Viktor_ was the mystery man.

Viktor appeared to have reached the same conclusion.

“Are you…you’re the one from the laundry room?”

Yuuri didn’t dare breathe as he nodded. He had barely stood a chance when the mystery man was some mere mortal, but if it was Viktor…

Oblivious to the meltdown taking place in front of him, Viktor laughed, his smile looking oddly like a heart.

“I knew that you were gorgeous, but I didn’t realize you were so funny! Or so terrible with your clothes! We are going to have to have a talk about the proper way to treat knitwear.”

Viktor reached forward and grabbed hold of Yuuri’s hand. His palm was warm against Yuuri’s, and Yuuri felt the fingers go tight around him.

“Come on, let’s go get coffee and you can tell me all about what it takes to make the legendary Yuuri Katsuki your boyfriend. And I’ll let you guess which print I’m wearing today,” Viktor said with a wink.

“Legendary?” Yuuri spluttered.

Clearly Viktor had mistaken him for someone else, but somehow Viktor’s grin became a little sloppy, his eyes wistful.

“God, you have no idea, do you?”

Gently Viktor tugged him back towards the path, whistling for Makkachin to follow. In a daze, Yuuri allowed himself to be led, before the second part of what Viktor had said clicked into place.

As they walked back, Yuuri started to think of all the thongs he’d seen in Viktor’s laundry and wondered which pair it might be today. What were the chances that he would get to see them modelled?

If the way that Viktor’s fingers tightened around Yuuri’s hand, or the way his gaze kept drifting down to Yuuri’s ass without the slightest attempt at subtlety, the chances were greater than average.

Yuuri expected to feel a flood of anxiety, something tearing through his thoughts, but instead he just felt…happy.

The Viktor that Yuuri had built up in his head might have been different from the extra, weirdly fastidious person he had been corresponding with, but Yuuri was looking forward to finding out how all the pieces fit together.

Trying not to worry about whether his hands felt too cold, or if his skin was too sweaty, Yuuri laced his fingers with Viktor’s and smiled up at him.

“I’m thinking today might be the leopard print.”

  


**Author's Note:**

> Find me on tumblr at thewesterndoor
> 
> Other fics in this series are going to involve different ships from various fandoms, but I might circle back to add another victuuri oneshot at some point (will very likely write up their first meeting).


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